Why Hillary Clinton spoke out on Obama

The interview with Clinton is consistent with a view of American exceptionalism. | AP Photo

Clinton has in the past discussed the suggested plan to arm Syrian rebels, an idea she and then-CIA head Gen. David Petraeus both pushed, as one of the fights she’d lost internally, including giving it a pointed reference in her book. Over the past 18 months she has crept around the edges of where there was daylight between her and Obama on specific issues. But now she is using the word “failure,” a pointed description that, according to several people familiar with her thinking, dovetails with her frustration with the administration’s response to certain issues in recent months.

A number of Democrats have privately insisted that while they expected Clinton to move away from Obama on the margins of foreign policy, it would be risky to separate too broadly. The risk? Affronting Democrats who did not support her in the 2008 presidential primary against Obama, and whose backing she’ll need if she is to run for president again. But Clinton has clearly decided that on certain issues, there is great risk in staying silent.

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On the question of the raging conflict between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip, Clinton stood firmly with Israel.

“If I were the prime minister of Israel, you’re damn right I would expect to have control over security [on the West Bank], because even if I’m dealing with [Palestinian leader Mahmoud] Abbas, who is 79 years old, and other members of Fatah, who are enjoying a better lifestyle and making money on all kinds of things, that does not protect Israel from the influx of Hamas or cross-border attacks from anywhere else.”

Clinton also pointed to growing anti-Semitism in Europe as she defended Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and said: “I think Israel did what it had to do to respond to the rockets. … Israel has a right to defend itself. The steps Hamas has taken to embed rockets and command-and-control facilities and tunnel entrances in civilian areas, this makes a response by Israel difficult.”

Her successor, Secretary of State John Kerry, was recently caught on a hot mic on “Fox News Sunday” appearing to criticize Netanyahu’s description of the Gaza operation as “pinpoint,” given the number of civilian casualties.

“I don’t know a nation, no matter what its values are — and I think that democratic nations have demonstrably better values in a conflict position — that hasn’t made errors, but ultimately the responsibility rests with Hamas,” Clinton said. “There’s no doubt in my mind that Hamas initiated this conflict. … So the ultimate responsibility has to rest on Hamas and the decisions it made.”

Poll after poll has shown that the American public has little stomach for conflict abroad, or for engaging U.S. troops in drawn-out battles. Some believe, as Goldberg noted, that the U.S. does not have a good enough track record to enforce rules elsewhere.

“I know that that is an opinion held by a certain group of Americans, I get all that. It’s not where I’m at,” Clinton said. Her organizing principle? “Peace, progress, and prosperity,” she said. “This worked for a very long time.”

When Goldberg noted that she “symbolizes” a type of foreign policy engagement that has dwindled in popularity in the U.S., Clinton said, “That’s because most Americans think of engagement and go immediately to military engagement. That’s why I use the phrase ‘smart power.’ I did it deliberately because I thought we had to have another way of talking about American engagement, other than unilateralism and the so-called boots on the ground.”

She added, “You know, when you’re down on yourself, and when you are hunkering down and pulling back, you’re not going to make any better decisions than when you were aggressively, belligerently putting yourself forward. One issue is that we don’t even tell our own story very well these days.”

Goldberg said he considers defeating communism and fascism to be “a big deal,” to which Clinton exclaimed, “That’s how I feel! Maybe this is old-fashioned. OK, I feel that this might be an old-fashioned idea — but I’m about to find out, in more ways than one.”

Goldberg interpreted that declaration from Clinton as essentially a statement of candidacy. Clinton has made similar asides in other interviews, but reading the tea leaves about whether she is going to run sort of misses the point — everything in her actions suggests she already is.